Young Lawyers Division
| Publication year | 2014 |
| Pages | 61 |
| Citation | Vol. 27 No. 2 Pg. 61 |
March, 2014
An Expert for All Seasons: Expert Testimony Usually Required, and Unusually Specific
Tanner Lenart
Expert witnesses are pervasive throughout all areas of the legal system. However, with apologies to Sir Thomas More, an expert for all seasons does not exist. With the most recent iteration of the discovery rules mandating the disclosure of experts prior to any demand, the tendency has fostered the attitude of Franz Kafka that it is better to have and not need than need and not have. However, attorneys should beware of such an approach, because in the case of expert witnesses, the quality of on-point experience and/or education is often better than a quantity of degrees on a resume. Before designating an expert, make sure he or she is an expert in the field you need - and not a well-known "expert" in some tangentially related endeavor. Without the right expert, your jury could be left to speculate, which is never a good idea. Whether or not an expert may testify at trial or present evidence to a jury is up to the court. Utah law has adopted the federal interpretation of Utah Rule of Evidence 702, which "assigns to trial judges a 'gatekeeper' responsibility to screen out unreliable expert testimony." Gunn Hill Dairy Props., LLC v. L, A. Dept. of Water & Power, 2012 UT App 20, ¶ 28, 269 P.3d 980 (internal quotation omitted). To fulfill this "gatekeeper" duty, "the court must first consider whether expert testimony would be helpful in assisting the trier of fact and whether the proposed expert has the necessary knowledge, skill, experience, training, or education to provide such assistance to the trier of fact." Id. ¶ 30. Accordingly, this "knowledge, skill, experience, training, or education" must be in the same topic and/or field as the issue to which the expert is testifying for the benefit of the jury. For example, in a case where a tourist engages a ski instructor for lessons and allegedly is injured due to the ski instructor's negligence, you may be tempted to hire Lindsay Vonn as your expert, because Ms. Vonn is, without a doubt, an expert skier. Her expertise, however, is limited to skiing and not its instruction, and she may not be allowed to opine on the standard of care for ski instructors. C.J.S. Evidence § 704 provides:
The competency of an expert is relative to the topic about which the witness is asked to testify. While a witness may be an expert in one field, he or she may not necessarily be an expert in...
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